1. Griselbrand is a really, really good reanimation target. I have yet to reanimate him and not win the game that turn.
2. The only times when Griselbrand doesn't win the game on the spot are: You're at 7 life, you're at 10 life and they have a bolt, or they have a moat out. I played elesh and iona for a while, but I realized that instead of being cute with them, it's better to just kill your opponent.
3. Abrupt Decay is great out of the board, because people will keep a hand with Force, graveyard hate, and nothing else.
Round 1: Red MUD
Game 1: He plays a turn 1 chalice into turn 2 blood moon. I beat it by going draw-discard-dredge and racing.
Game 2: He resolves a turn 2 ensnaring bridge and I didn't board in any way to get rid of it.
Game 3: I have a fast kill and use Ashen Rider to exile his bridge.
Round 2: Elves
Game 1: He keeps an average hand with a lot of mana elves, but I'm faster and faceroll with zombies.
Game 2: He gets a turn 2 scavenging ooze, and I can't kill him the next turn and am unable to overcome the ooze.
Game 3: I turn 1 him. His hand was double Deathrite and Ooze. Nothing much to say.
Round 3: Jund
Game 1: He has turn 1 deathrite, but I'm on the play and get a turn 2 kill.
Game 2: I keep a slow hand, and he has triple deathrite.
Game 3: He keeps a hand with Ooze, but I therapy it away and kill him turn 3.
Round 4/5: ID into top 8, second seed
Quarter finals: Esper stoneblade
Game 1: He keeps a hand with force and stoneforge mystic, but it isn't enough to race me.
Game 2: He resolves Cage into RIP. I have 2 decays, but I take too long to find the second land to play them and lose them to thoughtseize.
Game 3: He has cage and double force. I have double abrupt decay. I take this one easily.
Semi finals: Omni-Tell
Game 1: We both have turn 2 kills, but I'm on the play so I get there one turn faster.
Game 2: I keep a hand with double LED, careful study, dredgers, and lands. He spell pierces my first LED but the second one resolves. I figured if he had another Force he would've used it, so I play careful study and pitch my hand in response. He casts Mindbreak Trap and it's hilarious. However, in spite of the amount of time it buys him, he plays a bunch of cantrips but is only able to show and tell into Omniscience with no follow-up. He has a hand with four counterspells but it isn't good enough to stop me.
Finals: Jund (same guy from the swiss)
Game 1: My hand is land, triple LED, breakthrough, and Grave-troll. I windmill slam my hand onto the table and demolish him in one turn.
Game 2: I fumble a little and he has triple Deathrite again.
Game 3: I have an average hand, but he has the best possible 7 in Surgical, 2x duress, bayou, deathrite, wasteland, and goyf. It's crushing, but I lose by just 1 turn in the aftermath.
1. Griselbrand is a really, really good reanimation target. I have yet to reanimate him and not win the game that turn.
2. The only times when Griselbrand doesn't win the game on the spot are: You're at 7 life, you're at 10 life and they have a bolt, or they have a moat out. I played elesh and iona for a while, but I realized that instead of being cute with them, it's better to just kill your opponent.
3. Abrupt Decay is great out of the board, because people will keep a hand with Force, graveyard hate, and nothing else.
Round 1: Red MUD
Game 1: He plays a turn 1 chalice into turn 2 blood moon. I beat it by going draw-discard-dredge and racing.
Game 2: He resolves a turn 2 ensnaring bridge and I didn't board in any way to get rid of it.
Game 3: I have a fast kill and use Ashen Rider to exile his bridge.
Round 2: Elves
Game 1: He keeps an average hand with a lot of mana elves, but I'm faster and faceroll with zombies.
Game 2: He gets a turn 2 scavenging ooze, and I can't kill him the next turn and am unable to overcome the ooze.
Game 3: I turn 1 him. His hand was double Deathrite and Ooze. Nothing much to say.
Round 3: Jund
Game 1: He has turn 1 deathrite, but I'm on the play and get a turn 2 kill.
Game 2: I keep a slow hand, and he has triple deathrite.
Game 3: He keeps a hand with Ooze, but I therapy it away and kill him turn 3.
Round 4/5: ID into top 8, second seed
Quarter finals: Esper stoneblade
Game 1: He keeps a hand with force and stoneforge mystic, but it isn't enough to race me.
Game 2: He resolves Cage into RIP. I have 2 decays, but I take too long to find the second land to play them and lose them to thoughtseize.
Game 3: He has cage and double force. I have double abrupt decay. I take this one easily.
Semi finals: Omni-Tell
Game 1: We both have turn 2 kills, but I'm on the play so I get there one turn faster.
Game 2: I keep a hand with double LED, careful study, dredgers, and lands. He spell pierces my first LED but the second one resolves. I figured if he had another Force he would've used it, so I play careful study and pitch my hand in response. He casts Mindbreak Trap and it's hilarious. However, in spite of the amount of time it buys him, he plays a bunch of cantrips but is only able to show and tell into Omniscience with no follow-up. He has a hand with four counterspells but it isn't good enough to stop me.
Finals: Jund (same guy from the swiss)
Game 1: My hand is land, triple LED, breakthrough, and Grave-troll. I windmill slam my hand onto the table and demolish him in one turn.
Game 2: I fumble a little and he has triple Deathrite again.
Game 3: I have an average hand, but he has the best possible 7 in Surgical, 2x duress, bayou, deathrite, wasteland, and goyf. It's crushing, but I lose by just 1 turn in the aftermath.
im surprised not so much GY hate u face but nonetheless its very great report..
Just converted my Manaless Dredge deck to give Dredge a shot. I have only done a bunch of goldfishes and watched a few youtube, gonna take the deck out this week against all sorts of decks with my play group. Few things I have noticed I'm hoping you cats might be able to shed light on. I find this build much more challenging and interesting as I always felt like I was on autopilot with manaless dredge. My list is not yet established as I'm moving cards in and out. No LED and pretty standard list for now. Might try adding a Griselbrand.
1) Flame-kin Zealot has yet to seem like a desirable reanimation target. I have yet to be anywhere close to an alpha strike when it's time to bring him out. Usually due to Bridges showing up too late.
2) Narcomoebas quite often don't hit the battlefield and end up discard fodder.
3) Granted it's game state dependant, but is casting Breakthrough with X set to 0 fairly common in cases where you are digging for dredgers? On a few occasions I found myself wishing I had kept cards.
4) The most common win con that for me so far as I goldfish has been a reanimated Golgari Grave-Troll. Feels thin at best but perhaps does the trick more often than not. Guess I'll see when I run the gauntlet.
Edit: On further assessment, perhaps I'm not mulliganing as often as I should.
Granted these issues occur when the deck is struggling but that's when decisions become most difficult.
1) Flame-kin Zealot has yet to seem like a desirable reanimation target.
3) Granted it's game state dependant, but is casting Breakthrough with X set to 0 fairly common in cases where you are digging for dredgers? On a few occasions I found myself wishing I had kept cards.
4) The most common win con that for me so far as I goldfish has been a reanimated Golgari Grave-Troll.
Edit: On further assessment, perhaps I'm not mulliganing as often as I should.
There's no doubt others with more tournament experience than me, but I have been playin this deck for quite a while now.
There are many who don't play a reanimation target besides GGT in the main. Reason being, it's not completely necessary to, and whilst it's pretty rare someone else will Reanimate your Griselbrand, I'm not really too worried by that. My preferred option is Griselbrand, one-of.
Breakthrough on 0 isn't ideal, but if you're doing this I think this feeds immediately back to your other point, mulligans. I personally breakthrough for 0 often enough that I don't think it's a big deal or anything, it's all game-state relative, and we are afterall trying to build that grave as quick as possible.
I don't like to mull to oblivion, but LED-Dredge can afford to mull aggressively, and needs to, given the hate we can expect can be terminal.
I'm personally thinking the new ban's will result in RiP/Cage/LotV becoming more common again.
I realise that Delve were turning Miracles into the elephant in the room, but we at least still had a chance when they weren't running those gravehate cards.
If everyone goes back to pre-delve card choices, there's a very good chance the pre-delve answers in the form of gravehate are coming too....
I'm personally thinking the new ban's will result in RiP/Cage/LotV becoming more common again.
I realise that Delve were turning Miracles into the elephant in the room, but we at least still had a chance when they weren't running those gravehate cards.
If everyone goes back to pre-delve card choices, there's a very good chance the pre-delve answers in the form of gravehate are coming too....
On that note, has there been much testing running maindeck enchantment/artifact hate? A couple of Nature's Claims in addition to the Therapies may help game one matchups without affecting the decks consistency terribly should a graveyard hate filled meta come to pass.
Yeah I agree with this. It's too narrow to be maindeck material for me.
I'd rather run something that I can ditch to the grave in the main, knowing that Grafdiggers and friends won't be around, like Ancient Grudge or Ray of Revelation. But I wouldn't, as they're not as effective as Abrupt Decay against active hate in game2/3.
To be honest, the only cards I've used in the main in addition to the typical/expected list, that has actually been good and consistent, has been Street Wraith.
Don't you miss Careful study?
It is a very good enabler/drawer and its costs blue mana, wich you can pay with any of your 12 lands.
Anyway, I've always been a fan of Quadlaser, there's no need for card like Dread Return in a deck that powerful and consistent on game 1.
Some Cabal therapy on turn 1 or 2 followed by Ichorid beats is all we need.
Game 2-3 however I had a hard time casting my answers to hate or whatever Nature's Claims and Firestorm don't cost Blue mana so there's only 8 land to cast them.
Did you ever feel the need to have some additionnal gold lands in the sideboard?
there is really only two decks in the format that play port and thats mono white hatebears and goblins. Yeah it would probably be better, but its a fraction better.
Don't you miss Careful study?
It is a very good enabler/drawer and its costs blue mana, wich you can pay with any of your 12 lands.
Anyway, I've always been a fan of Quadlaser, there's no need for card like Dread Return in a deck that powerful and consistent on game 1.
Some Cabal therapy on turn 1 or 2 followed by Ichorid beats is all we need.
Game 2-3 however I had a hard time casting my answers to hate or whatever Nature's Claims and Firestorm don't cost Blue mana so there's only 8 land to cast them.
Did you ever feel the need to have some additional gold lands in the sideboard?
never have i missed study honestly. its not very often that the land issue comes up, id much rather have wraith to feed the Ichorid and nether shadow. And as far as the hate goes, you just have to roll with the punches sometimes, we have the hate and we have 8 lands to cast them, and chain of vapor isn't really the best answer. Id rather my opponent just mull them selves into oblivion looking for one of the two GY hate they have, which they tend to do.
And on another note the nether shadow's in the main have been astounding. no its not he biggest body in the world but it gets in A TON, and it can be rather difficult for decks to permanently deal with. and he has haste.
Private Mod Note
():
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Currently playing in Modern: BBB8Rack
Currently Playing in Legacy:
Foil BELCHER
"Never interrupt your opponent while he's making a mistake"
i just bought into Dredge. As a DnT player I was impressed with the aggressive style of the deck and the quick wins. It is also a cheap deck to build. As a person who has never really use LED, how does one use it in this deck?
Private Mod Note
():
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Vintage-Shops/BUG/Dredge Legacy-Death and Taxes/Nic Fit
Thanks to Heroes of the Plane Studios for the amazing sig!
So if you've ever played Storm or against Storm you've seen them cast an Infernal Tutor and then crack LED in response to empty their hand and make 3 mana. You can do the same thing in Dredge.
An ideal turn 1 play from Dredge is to play a land and a LED, then cast a loot spell or breakthrough and retaining priority crack the LED in response. This gets any dredgers in your graveyard for the draw portion of the loot spell. You typically crack for Red mana so you can flash back Faithless Looting after resolving your initial loot.
Or you can just play LED and crack it immediately to flashback a Faithless Looting in your hand.
One neat play is if you are on the draw and keep your opening 7, you can play Cephalid Coliseum and LED. Crack LED for Blue. Put LED + the 6 cards in your hand into the graveyard and activate Coliseum
At its worst, LED reads: 0: Discard your hand.
Private Mod Note
():
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
"If we don't know what we are doing, the enemy certainly can't anticipate our future actions!"
-Anonymous
Hi, guys! I'm a relatively new Legacy and LED Dredge player although I've been playing Magic for 12 years.
I have read almost every page in this thread (and also in the Dredge thread in The source) but I need your advice as I couldn't find an answer to the following question (maybe it is obvious to the most of you): having a rainbow land, LED, dredger and looting effect in our starting hand... what is the correct play sequence?
Option 1: Rainbow land ->LED->Looting
Option 2: LED->Rainbow land->Looting
On the draw, having the opponent played an island, I'd go for the first option since it seems to be much safer (just to avoid LED to be potentially "Dazed"); not seeing any blue source, I think the play sequence is not relevant.
What would you do on the play against an unknown opponent? And what in case you are on the play and already know the opponent is playing counters? Is there any situation you would prefer Option 2?
My first question is this: how much are people liking Abrupt Decay? I'm debating whether the "cannot be countered" clause is worth the extra mana. I could see myself possibly splitting sideboard slots between Nature's Claim and AD.
My second question is this: How many people are still playing Putrid Imp? I was also playing Phantasmagorian before that and I really liked it, but I felt that, despite the fact that I enjoyed having an extra way to discard and an extra black creature for Ichorid, it was usually not necessary to win.
Edit: I just thought of another question. How many people are playing Lotus Petal and why would it be in the sideboard?
Thanks very much for your responses! I like your reasoning for pretty much everything.
I had a feeling I'd one day have to take out one or two Firestorm, and that's okay, I'll just miss them because they're so fun to cast
So I see the use of Lotus Petal, especially when it comes to casting Abrupt Decay. My new question is this: why not mainboard everything that makes our deck faster? Often times fast decks sideboard out a little speed to put in some resilience. It seems a bit counterintuitive to me to not play the fastest mainboard we are capable of. Of course, I'm still a fan of the FKZ combo and will be keeping that guy for the foreseeable future. Maybe without the combo there is no reason to make our maindeck faster.
The problem is fkz is beatable by people who have actually played against dredge. If a smart opponent can bolt/abrupt decay one of their dudes with your bridge triggers on the stack you've only successfully reanimated a 3/3 haster. I once had a miracles player return his batterskull killing the germ token at the right moment to stop a fkz death.
Now I run a griselbrand and an iona. They both basically end the game as well.
Okay, I see all your points. Thank you for the tips!
I played at my game store last night to my best result so far of 3-1 (although it was only one bad Cabal Therapy that kept me from going 4-0).
For anyone who is interested here were my matchups:
Round 1: 2-0 against Counterbalance/Top
Round 2: 2-1 against Burn
Round 3: 1-2 against BUG Delver (with super bad luck)
Round 4: 2-1 against Izzet Delver
I didn't get the chance to try any Abrupt Decay because I don't have any yet, but I did try two Lotus Petal in my sideboard and was glad to see them when I did. I almost want to mainboard them.
My first question is this: how much are people liking Abrupt Decay? I'm debating whether the "cannot be countered" clause is worth the extra mana. I could see myself possibly splitting sideboard slots between Nature's Claim and AD.
My second question is this: How many people are still playing Putrid Imp? I was also playing Phantasmagorian before that and I really liked it, but I felt that, despite the fact that I enjoyed having an extra way to discard and an extra black creature for Ichorid, it was usually not necessary to win.
Edit: I just thought of another question. How many people are playing Lotus Petal and why would it be in the sideboard?
I personally don't like Abrupt Decay. I tried to, but I prefer Claims backed up by Therapy. Petal is useful against taxing. But I don't feel the need for them unless I'm running Abrupt decay.
RE: Phantasmagorian, I like the card but not here as it's a much better card in manaless where we're discarding at end of turn.
I personally run a 3 Street Wraith, 2 Putrid Imp split. Imp is important, the longer you play the deck, the more you'll want them. I really like Wraith, given it's a free dredge on an opponents' turn that cannot be countered.
I wouldn't go with only 1 Imp in the main. Not enough food for Icky, you'll be exiling Dredgers.
I also don't like Memory's journey. I prefer Faerie Macabre as it can't be countered, it's food for Icky, and it's black for Unmask etc, and it doesn't require mana. I find this especially useful against to use on my own graveyard against extraction.
That said, I don't usually play gravehate other than Leyline of the Void myself, as it stops my bridges getting nuked.
I find Putrid Imp to be good, but not amazing. I have him as a one-of currently because he has at least some value both in and out of the graveyard, but never thought they were that great as a playset. Maybe it's my meta.
I don't usually play gravehate other than Leyline of the Void myself, as it stops my bridges getting nuked.
What do you mean?
I might be completely wrong, due to being new to the deck, but I assume he means something along the lines of: Your opponent cannot bolt their own delver to exile bridge from below, due to LotV being a replacement effect and cancelling it out. So I assume he means that LotV can prevent your bridges from getting wrecked by an opponent saccing or self-destructing one of their own creatures to destroy them.
Private Mod Note
():
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Modern Decks: B/W Tokens, Living End, R/W Lockdown (a.k.a. PillowFort)
Working on:G/W Hatebears, Mono Blue Tron, U/R Delver
Quote from TheDasuri:
First they came for the ghosts of past standards like Jace the Mindsculptor and artifact lands
And I did not speak out
Because I was not a filthy spike
Then they came for the cantrips
And I did not speak out
Because I was not a filthy blue player
Then they came for the Bloodbraid Elves
And I did not speak out
Because I was not a filthy midrange player
Then they came for the Seething Song
And I did not speak out
Because I was not a filthy combo player
Then they came for me
And there was no one left
1. Griselbrand is a really, really good reanimation target. I have yet to reanimate him and not win the game that turn.
2. The only times when Griselbrand doesn't win the game on the spot are: You're at 7 life, you're at 10 life and they have a bolt, or they have a moat out. I played elesh and iona for a while, but I realized that instead of being cute with them, it's better to just kill your opponent.
3. Abrupt Decay is great out of the board, because people will keep a hand with Force, graveyard hate, and nothing else.
So here's the list.
4 Stinkweed Imp
3 Golgari Thug
4 Faithless Looting
4 Careful Study
4 Breakthrough
4 Lion's Eye Diamond
4 Bridge from Below
4 Narchomoeba
3 Ichorid
3 Dread Return
4 Cabal Therapy
1 Flame-Kin Zealot
4 City of Brass
4 Mana Confluence
4 Cephalid Colliseum
4 Nature's Claim
4 Abrupt Decay
2 Firestorm
2 Dakmor Salvage
2 Lotus Petal
1 Ashen Rider
So here's my tournament report.
Event: GPT
Players: 21
Deck: Dredge
Round 1: Red MUD
Game 1: He plays a turn 1 chalice into turn 2 blood moon. I beat it by going draw-discard-dredge and racing.
Game 2: He resolves a turn 2 ensnaring bridge and I didn't board in any way to get rid of it.
Game 3: I have a fast kill and use Ashen Rider to exile his bridge.
Round 2: Elves
Game 1: He keeps an average hand with a lot of mana elves, but I'm faster and faceroll with zombies.
Game 2: He gets a turn 2 scavenging ooze, and I can't kill him the next turn and am unable to overcome the ooze.
Game 3: I turn 1 him. His hand was double Deathrite and Ooze. Nothing much to say.
Round 3: Jund
Game 1: He has turn 1 deathrite, but I'm on the play and get a turn 2 kill.
Game 2: I keep a slow hand, and he has triple deathrite.
Game 3: He keeps a hand with Ooze, but I therapy it away and kill him turn 3.
Round 4/5: ID into top 8, second seed
Quarter finals: Esper stoneblade
Game 1: He keeps a hand with force and stoneforge mystic, but it isn't enough to race me.
Game 2: He resolves Cage into RIP. I have 2 decays, but I take too long to find the second land to play them and lose them to thoughtseize.
Game 3: He has cage and double force. I have double abrupt decay. I take this one easily.
Semi finals: Omni-Tell
Game 1: We both have turn 2 kills, but I'm on the play so I get there one turn faster.
Game 2: I keep a hand with double LED, careful study, dredgers, and lands. He spell pierces my first LED but the second one resolves. I figured if he had another Force he would've used it, so I play careful study and pitch my hand in response. He casts Mindbreak Trap and it's hilarious. However, in spite of the amount of time it buys him, he plays a bunch of cantrips but is only able to show and tell into Omniscience with no follow-up. He has a hand with four counterspells but it isn't good enough to stop me.
Finals: Jund (same guy from the swiss)
Game 1: My hand is land, triple LED, breakthrough, and Grave-troll. I windmill slam my hand onto the table and demolish him in one turn.
Game 2: I fumble a little and he has triple Deathrite again.
Game 3: I have an average hand, but he has the best possible 7 in Surgical, 2x duress, bayou, deathrite, wasteland, and goyf. It's crushing, but I lose by just 1 turn in the aftermath.
im surprised not so much GY hate u face but nonetheless its very great report..
seems Abrupt Decay was very effective
Plays like your makes me excited to play Dredge s'mores.
1) Flame-kin Zealot has yet to seem like a desirable reanimation target. I have yet to be anywhere close to an alpha strike when it's time to bring him out. Usually due to Bridges showing up too late.
2) Narcomoebas quite often don't hit the battlefield and end up discard fodder.
3) Granted it's game state dependant, but is casting Breakthrough with X set to 0 fairly common in cases where you are digging for dredgers? On a few occasions I found myself wishing I had kept cards.
4) The most common win con that for me so far as I goldfish has been a reanimated Golgari Grave-Troll. Feels thin at best but perhaps does the trick more often than not. Guess I'll see when I run the gauntlet.
Edit: On further assessment, perhaps I'm not mulliganing as often as I should.
Granted these issues occur when the deck is struggling but that's when decisions become most difficult.
Thanks in advance.
There's no doubt others with more tournament experience than me, but I have been playin this deck for quite a while now.
There are many who don't play a reanimation target besides GGT in the main. Reason being, it's not completely necessary to, and whilst it's pretty rare someone else will Reanimate your Griselbrand, I'm not really too worried by that. My preferred option is Griselbrand, one-of.
Breakthrough on 0 isn't ideal, but if you're doing this I think this feeds immediately back to your other point, mulligans. I personally breakthrough for 0 often enough that I don't think it's a big deal or anything, it's all game-state relative, and we are afterall trying to build that grave as quick as possible.
I don't like to mull to oblivion, but LED-Dredge can afford to mull aggressively, and needs to, given the hate we can expect can be terminal.
I realise that Delve were turning Miracles into the elephant in the room, but we at least still had a chance when they weren't running those gravehate cards.
If everyone goes back to pre-delve card choices, there's a very good chance the pre-delve answers in the form of gravehate are coming too....
On that note, has there been much testing running maindeck enchantment/artifact hate? A couple of Nature's Claims in addition to the Therapies may help game one matchups without affecting the decks consistency terribly should a graveyard hate filled meta come to pass.
Yeah I agree with this. It's too narrow to be maindeck material for me.
I'd rather run something that I can ditch to the grave in the main, knowing that Grafdiggers and friends won't be around, like Ancient Grudge or Ray of Revelation. But I wouldn't, as they're not as effective as Abrupt Decay against active hate in game2/3.
To be honest, the only cards I've used in the main in addition to the typical/expected list, that has actually been good and consistent, has been Street Wraith.
4 stinkweed imp
4 golgari thug
4 faithless looting
4 breakthrough
4 street wraith
4 cabal therapy
4 lion's eye diamond
4 bridge from below
4 ichorid
4 nether shadow
4 cephalid coliseum
4 city of brass
4 gemstone mine
3 firestorm
3 nature's claim
3 dread return
2 memory's journey
1 ashen rider
1 iona, shield of emeria
1 elesh norn, grand cenobite
1 flame-kin zealot
Currently playing in Modern:
BBB8Rack
Currently Playing in Legacy:
Foil BELCHER
"Never interrupt your opponent while he's making a mistake"
Don't you miss Careful study?
It is a very good enabler/drawer and its costs blue mana, wich you can pay with any of your 12 lands.
Anyway, I've always been a fan of Quadlaser, there's no need for card like Dread Return in a deck that powerful and consistent on game 1.
Some Cabal therapy on turn 1 or 2 followed by Ichorid beats is all we need.
Game 2-3 however I had a hard time casting my answers to hate or whatever
Nature's Claims and Firestorm don't cost Blue mana so there's only 8 land to cast them.
Did you ever feel the need to have some additionnal gold lands in the sideboard?
there is really only two decks in the format that play port and thats mono white hatebears and goblins. Yeah it would probably be better, but its a fraction better.
never have i missed study honestly. its not very often that the land issue comes up, id much rather have wraith to feed the Ichorid and nether shadow. And as far as the hate goes, you just have to roll with the punches sometimes, we have the hate and we have 8 lands to cast them, and chain of vapor isn't really the best answer. Id rather my opponent just mull them selves into oblivion looking for one of the two GY hate they have, which they tend to do.
And on another note the nether shadow's in the main have been astounding. no its not he biggest body in the world but it gets in A TON, and it can be rather difficult for decks to permanently deal with. and he has haste.
Currently playing in Modern:
BBB8Rack
Currently Playing in Legacy:
Foil BELCHER
"Never interrupt your opponent while he's making a mistake"
Thanks to Heroes of the Plane Studios for the amazing sig!
An ideal turn 1 play from Dredge is to play a land and a LED, then cast a loot spell or breakthrough and retaining priority crack the LED in response. This gets any dredgers in your graveyard for the draw portion of the loot spell. You typically crack for Red mana so you can flash back Faithless Looting after resolving your initial loot.
Or you can just play LED and crack it immediately to flashback a Faithless Looting in your hand.
You can also play out LED and use it to play around soft counters like Daze, Spell Pierce, and Flusterstorm.
One neat play is if you are on the draw and keep your opening 7, you can play Cephalid Coliseum and LED. Crack LED for Blue. Put LED + the 6 cards in your hand into the graveyard and activate Coliseum
At its worst, LED reads: 0: Discard your hand.
-Anonymous
Thanks to Heroes of the Plane Studios for the amazing sig!
here is what i am currently running:
4 stinkweed imp
3 golgari thug
4 faithless looting
3 putrid imp
3 breakthrough
4 careful study
4 cabal therapy
4 lion's eye diamond
4 bridge from below
4 narcomoeba
3 ichorid
4 cephalid coliseum
1 city of brass
4 gemstone mine
4 mana confluence
2 dread return
1 flame-kin zealot
3 firestorm
3 nauture's claim
2 chain of vapor
1 flayer of the hatebound
1 iona, shield of emeria
1 elesh norn, grand cenobite
Thanks to Heroes of the Plane Studios for the amazing sig!
I have read almost every page in this thread (and also in the Dredge thread in The source) but I need your advice as I couldn't find an answer to the following question (maybe it is obvious to the most of you): having a rainbow land, LED, dredger and looting effect in our starting hand... what is the correct play sequence?
Option 1: Rainbow land ->LED->Looting
Option 2: LED->Rainbow land->Looting
On the draw, having the opponent played an island, I'd go for the first option since it seems to be much safer (just to avoid LED to be potentially "Dazed"); not seeing any blue source, I think the play sequence is not relevant.
What would you do on the play against an unknown opponent? And what in case you are on the play and already know the opponent is playing counters? Is there any situation you would prefer Option 2?
I thought I'd share my current list and ask a couple opinions.
Ichorus
4 Lion's Eye Diamond
2 City of Brass
3 Cephalid Coliseum
4 Mana Confluence
4 Gemstone Mine
Creature spells
1 Putrid Imp
4 Narcomoeba
4 Golgari Thug
4 Stinkweed Imp
4 Ichorid
1 Flame-Kin Zealot
4 Golgari Grave-Troll
4 Careful Study
4 Cabal Therapy
4 Faithless Looting
4 Breakthrough
4 Bridge from Below
1 Dread Return
2 Putrid Imp
2 Pithing Needle
3 Nature's Claim
4 Firestorm
2 Memory's Journey
1 Elesh Norn, Grand Cenobite
1 Ashen Rider
My first question is this: how much are people liking Abrupt Decay? I'm debating whether the "cannot be countered" clause is worth the extra mana. I could see myself possibly splitting sideboard slots between Nature's Claim and AD.
My second question is this: How many people are still playing Putrid Imp? I was also playing Phantasmagorian before that and I really liked it, but I felt that, despite the fact that I enjoyed having an extra way to discard and an extra black creature for Ichorid, it was usually not necessary to win.
Edit: I just thought of another question. How many people are playing Lotus Petal and why would it be in the sideboard?
I had a feeling I'd one day have to take out one or two Firestorm, and that's okay, I'll just miss them because they're so fun to cast
So I see the use of Lotus Petal, especially when it comes to casting Abrupt Decay. My new question is this: why not mainboard everything that makes our deck faster? Often times fast decks sideboard out a little speed to put in some resilience. It seems a bit counterintuitive to me to not play the fastest mainboard we are capable of. Of course, I'm still a fan of the FKZ combo and will be keeping that guy for the foreseeable future. Maybe without the combo there is no reason to make our maindeck faster.
Thanks again for your thoughts!
Now I run a griselbrand and an iona. They both basically end the game as well.
I played at my game store last night to my best result so far of 3-1 (although it was only one bad Cabal Therapy that kept me from going 4-0).
For anyone who is interested here were my matchups:
Round 1: 2-0 against Counterbalance/Top
Round 2: 2-1 against Burn
Round 3: 1-2 against BUG Delver (with super bad luck)
Round 4: 2-1 against Izzet Delver
My most interesting opening hand was probably 3 x Lion's Eye Diamond + Breakthrough + Golgari Thug. I had to wait two turns to find a Faithless Looting despite casting Breakthrough on turn 1, but when I found my lootings on turn 3 it was awesome.
I didn't get the chance to try any Abrupt Decay because I don't have any yet, but I did try two Lotus Petal in my sideboard and was glad to see them when I did. I almost want to mainboard them.
I personally don't like Abrupt Decay. I tried to, but I prefer Claims backed up by Therapy. Petal is useful against taxing. But I don't feel the need for them unless I'm running Abrupt decay.
RE: Phantasmagorian, I like the card but not here as it's a much better card in manaless where we're discarding at end of turn.
I personally run a 3 Street Wraith, 2 Putrid Imp split. Imp is important, the longer you play the deck, the more you'll want them. I really like Wraith, given it's a free dredge on an opponents' turn that cannot be countered.
I wouldn't go with only 1 Imp in the main. Not enough food for Icky, you'll be exiling Dredgers.
I also don't like Memory's journey. I prefer Faerie Macabre as it can't be countered, it's food for Icky, and it's black for Unmask etc, and it doesn't require mana. I find this especially useful against to use on my own graveyard against extraction.
That said, I don't usually play gravehate other than Leyline of the Void myself, as it stops my bridges getting nuked.
I find Putrid Imp to be good, but not amazing. I have him as a one-of currently because he has at least some value both in and out of the graveyard, but never thought they were that great as a playset. Maybe it's my meta.
What do you mean?
I might be completely wrong, due to being new to the deck, but I assume he means something along the lines of: Your opponent cannot bolt their own delver to exile bridge from below, due to LotV being a replacement effect and cancelling it out. So I assume he means that LotV can prevent your bridges from getting wrecked by an opponent saccing or self-destructing one of their own creatures to destroy them.
Working on:G/W Hatebears, Mono Blue Tron, U/R Delver
Quote from TheDasuri:
First they came for the ghosts of past standards like Jace the Mindsculptor and artifact lands
And I did not speak out
Because I was not a filthy spike
Then they came for the cantrips
And I did not speak out
Because I was not a filthy blue player
Then they came for the Bloodbraid Elves
And I did not speak out
Because I was not a filthy midrange player
Then they came for the Seething Song
And I did not speak out
Because I was not a filthy combo player
Then they came for me
And there was no one left